"Skills can be taught," the late Anthony Boudrain observed in his memoir 'Kitchen Confidential'.
"Character you either have or you don't have."
That quote should resonate with anyone watching Philip Barantini's low budget restaurant flick 'Boiling Point'.
Because while it salutes culinary genius, it is mostly interested in the people who create food and especially their flaws.
Shot in one take, this dazzling low budget English indie feature finds Stephen Graham and a cast that includes Vinette Robinson, Ray Panthaki and Jason Flemyng at their very best.
But it's also a bravura cinematic experiment with Barantini, his cinematographer Matthew Lewis and sound recordist Ron Entwistle taking the realist filmmaking tradition to dizzying heights.
At the start of Barantini's movie, we see Graham's head chef Andy Jones glued to his iPhone as he arrives for work in a London restaurant.
Already late for what is going to be a busy Friday night, we can tell as he is followed by Lewis' camera that Andy is a drowning man.
His family life is falling apart - he is apologetically calls his ex about missing his son's swimming gala.
And he looks terrible as if he is nursing a monster hangover.
On Andy's arrival inside the restaurant, Barantini cranks up the heat a little more.
Vinette Robinson's sous chef Carly is firefighting as Thomas Coombes' environmental health inspector Mr Lovejoy peppers her and her colleagues with questions.
He downgrades the restaurant from five stars to three, not because of these lapses, but as a result of Andy's poor record keeping.
Raging with the decision, Andy berates Camille and Tony and clashes with Panthaki's Freeman and Carly over their limited menu.
He fumes about there being no turbot until it is pointed out that it has been pulled due to his mistake.
Calming down, he apologises to Camille and teaches Tony how to shell an oyster.
Carly asks if Andy has had a word with Alice Feetham's front of house manager Beth about getting a pay rise.
Assuring her it is in hand and fielding more phone calls about his son, Andy is rattled when Beth announces Jason Flemyng's celebrity chef, his former mentor Alastair Skye has booked a table.
As guests start to drift in, the front of house staff Aine Rose Daly's Robyn, Gary Lamont's Dean and Lauryn Ajufo's Andrea slowly kick into gear.
Inevitably he sends back his meal after complaining that the lamb is pink - much to the consternation of Carly and Freeman.
A group of three irritating blokes claiming to be Instagramers complain there is nothing on the menu they like and lean on Beth to get the staff to cook them steak and chips.
A couple arrive for a romantic meal and check with Beth that they have remembered the woman has a nut allergy but it has not been communicated properly to the kitchen.
A group of women arrive for a raucous night out and hit it off with Dean.
Alastair Skye turns up with Lourdes Faberes' food critic Sara Southworth as his guest which further unnerves Andy.
The real purpose of his visit, however, becomes clear.
'Boiling Point' is a masterclass in immersive realist filmmaking with Lewis' camera taking the audience right into the heart of the action.
As the camera floats between characters, every scene is made to count.
Nothing is incidental.
So when Beth goes to the bathroom to tearfully ring her father or when it captures the reserved but gifted saucier's anxiety or a lazy member of staff going out to empty the bins, it is yet another piece of the narrative jigsaw put in place.
Watching Barantini's movie is a nerve shredding experience on a par with the Safdie Brothers' 'Uncut Gems.'
A lot of that can be credited to Barantini and James Cummings' deft script.
But a huge part of it is down to Graham's twitchy central performance which confirms him as one of the best actors working in film and television today.
Nervously swigging from a bottle at regular intervals, Andy prowls around the restaurant trying to give the aura of a chef in control but is clearly failing.
In between moments of great stress, Graham also gives us flashes of Andy's humanity, as when he compliments Stephen McMillan's nervous saucier Billy.
He mostly delivers a gobsmacking Harvey Keitel style portrayal of a cornered man on a downward spiral.
With every role he takes on, Graham seems to raise the bar but the acting honours in this film are not entirely his.
Throwaway comments from Robinson's Carly and Panthaki's Freeman reveal the extent to which their characters have been carrying Andy.
Both are superb - the former bottling up her frustration as she tries to nudge her mentor back to his best, the latter full of simmering rage.
Flemyng also stands out as he grandstands in front of Faberes' food critic - passive aggressively claiming credit for all of Andy's dishes and yet quick to find the slightest fault with them.
Everyone, though, from Feetham to Coombes, McMillan to Hannah Walters as the kindly pastry chef Emily gives their all.
In between acting jobs, Barantini periodically worked in the restaurant trade which explains why 'Boiling Point' oozes authenticity.
What began life as a short film has become one of the most exciting feature debuts from an English director in years.
A bit like a Ken Loach film drenched in Red Bull, 'Boiling Point' announces Barantini as a major filmmaking talent.
Actors will be falling over themselves to work with him.
Cinematographers and editors will be queuing around the block to collaborate after this superb film.
Good luck trying to better it.
('Boiling Point' opened in UK and Irish cinemas on January 7, 2022)
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